Gender, War and Conflict, INTL 200-02/WMST 276-01 Tuesdays and Thursday 3-4:20, Fellows 203 Denison University, Spring 2007 Instructor: Isis Nusair Email: [email protected] Office: Knapp 210C, Phone: x8537 Office Hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays 4:30-6 pm Course Description This course aims to make feminist sense of contemporary wars and conflicts. It analyzes the intersections between gender, race, class, and ethnicity in national conflicts. The class traces the gendered processes of defining citizenship, national identity and security, and examines the role of institutions like the military in the construction of femininity and masculinity. The course focuses on the gendered impact of war and conflict through examining torture, mass rape, genocide, and refugee displacement. It analyzes the strategies used by women’s and feminist movements to oppose war and conflict, and the gendered impact of war prevention, peacekeeping, and post-war reconstruction. The class draws on cases from Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East and North Africa. The class is interdisciplinary and gives equal weight to theory and practice while drawing on writings by local and global activists and theorists. Class Requirements Students in addition to reading the course material, attending screening sessions, and participating in class discussion will monitor at least one media outlet and trace the representation of gender, war and conflict. The course requirements also include 2 class presentations, 5 papers, and a final research paper. Papers constitute 50% of the evaluation, the final research paper constitutes 30% of the evaluation, class presentations constitute 10% of the evaluation, and class participation and web-postings constitute 10% of the evaluation. Course Policies • Plagiarism: Students and faculty at Denison University and the Department of International Studies are committed to academic integrity and will not tolerate any violation of this principle. Academic honesty is the cornerstone of teaching and learning. Academic dishonesty is, in most cases, intellectual theft. It includes, but is not limited to, providing or receiving assistance in a manner not authorized by the instructor in the creation of work to be submitted for evaluation. This standard applies to all work ranging from daily homework assignments to major exams. Students must clearly cite any sources consulted, not only for quoted phrases but also for ideas and information that are not common knowledge. Neither ignorance nor carelessness is an acceptable defense in cases of plagiarism. It is the student's responsibility to follow the appropriate citation format. As is indicated in Denison's Student Handbook, available through www.mydenison.edu, instructors must refer every act of academic dishonesty to the Associate Provost, and violations may result in failure in the course, suspension, or expulsion. See: http://www.denison.edu/studentaffairs/handbook/article7.html • Disability: Any student who feels he or she may need an accommodation based on the impact of a disability should contact me privately as soon as possible to discuss his or her specific needs. I rely on the Academic Support & Enrichment Center in 104 Doane to 1 verify the need for reasonable accommodations based on documentation on file in that office. • Attendance: You are expected to attend class regularly. More than three absences during the semester will seriously affect your final grade. • Evaluation: Students are required to write midterm and final evaluations of their performance in the class. • Printing: All class material should be printed double-sided in order to save on paper and protect the environment. Reading Material • Reading materials will be available at the bookstore and on ERES. Various handouts and supplementary material will be distributed in class and posted on Blackboard. Required Books • Barakat, Hoda. 2006. The Stone of Laughter. Massachusetts: Interlink Books. • Enloe, Cynthia. 2004. The Curious Feminist: Searching for Women in a New Age of Empire. Berkeley: University of California Press. • Giles, Wenona and Jennifer Hyndman, eds. 2004. Sites of Violence: Gender and Conflict Zones. Berkeley: University of California Press. • Lorentzen, Lois Ann and Jennifer Turpin, eds. 1998. The Women & War Reader. New York: New York University Press. • Mazurana, Dyan and Angela Raven-Roberts, and Jane Parpart, eds. 2005. Gender, Conflict, and Peacekeeping. New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Recommended Books • Abdo, Nahla and Ronit Lentin. 2002. Women and the Politics of Military Confrontation: Palestinian and Israeli Gendered Narratives of Dislocation. New York: Berghahn Books. • Addis, Elisabetta et al, eds. 1994. Women Soldiers: Images and Realities. New York: St. Martin’s Press. • Brock-Utne, Birgit. 1989. Feminist Perspectives on Peace and Peace Education. New York: Pergamon Press. • Cockburn, Cynthia. 1998. The Space Between Us: Negotiating Gender and National Identities in Conflict. London: Zed Books. • Cooke, Miriam and Angela Woollacott. 1993. Gendering War Talk. Princeton: Princeton University Press. • El-Sheikh, Hanan. 1994. The Story of Zahra. New York: Anchor Books. • Enloe, Cynthia. 1993. The Morning After: Sexual Politics at the End of the Cold War. Berkeley: University of California Press. • Enloe, Cynthia. 1989. Making Feminist Sense of International Politics: Bananas, Beaches & Bases. Berkeley: University of California Press. • Giles, Wenona et al, eds. 2003. Feminists Under Fire: Exchanges Across War Zones. Toronto: Between the Lines. • Hawkesworth, Mary. 2006. Globalization and Feminist Activism. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. • Hawthorne, Susan and Bronwyn Winter. eds. 2003. After Shock September 11, 2001: Global Feminist Perspectives. Vancouver: Raincoat Books. • Jacobs, Susie et al, eds. 2000. States of Conflict: Gender, Violence, and Resistance. London: Zed Books. • Majaj, Lisa Suheir et al, eds. 2002. Intersections: Gender, Nation, and Community in Arab Women’s Novels. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press. 2 • Peterson, Spike and Anne Sisson Runyan. 1993. Global Gender Issues: Dilemmas in World Politics. Boulder: Westview Press. • Reardon, Betty. 1985. Sexism and the War System. New York: Teachers College, Columbia University. • Sturdevant, Saundra Pollock and Brenda Stoltzfus. 1992. Let the Good Times Roll: Prostitution and the U.S. Military in Asia. New York: The New Press. • Waller, Marguerite and Jennifer Rycenga. 2001. Frontline Feminisms: Women, War, and Resistance. New York: Routledge. Films • Breaking the History of Silence: The Women’s International War Crimes Tribunal for the Trial of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery, 2001, 68 minutes. • Calling the Ghosts, 1996, 63 minutes. • Carry Greenham Home, Beeban Kidron and Amanda Richardson, 1983, 66 minutes. • Fahrenheit 9/11, 2004, 118 minutes. • Frontline: The Torture Question, 2005, 90 minutes. • Frontline: The Triumph of Evil, 1999, 60 minutes. • Frontline: Truth, War, and Consequences, 2003, 90 minutes. • Frontline: Rumsfeld’s War, 2004, 90 minutes. • Occupation Dreamland, 2005, 78 minutes. • Officer and a Gentleman, 1982, 122 minutes. • Saving Private Ryan, 1998, 170 minutes. • The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, 1983, 62 minutes. • The Official Story, 1986, 112 minutes. • The Vienna Tribunal, 1994, 48 minutes. Class Schedule January 16th: General Introduction - Housekeeping and Course Outline • Why is a feminist analysis necessary for our understanding of conflict, war and peace? January 18th: Women and Militarization • Turpin, Jennifer. 1998. “Many Faces: Women Confronting War,” in Lois Ann Lorentzen and Jennifer Turpin, eds. The Women & War Reader, pp. 3-18. • Enloe, Cynthia. 2000. “How Do They Militarize a Can of Soup?” In Cynthia Enloe. Maneuvers: The International Politics of Militarizing Women’s Lives, pp. 1-34. Optional reading: • Read pages 145-154 in Enloe’s The Curious Feminist. • Enloe, Cynthia. 2000. “Conclusions: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions.” In Maneuvers: The International Politics of Militarizing Women’s Lives, 288-300. • Giles, Wenona and Hyndman, Jennifer. 2004. “Introduction: Gender and Conflict in a Global Context,” in Wenona Giles and Jennifer Hyndman, eds. Sites of Violence, pp. 3- 23. January 23rd: The Curious Feminist • Read introduction (pp. 1-10) and chapters 1-5 (pp. 13-82) in Enloe’s The Curious Feminist. January 25th: Missions, Men and Masculinities • “Missions, Men and Masculinities: Carol Cohn Discusses Saving Private Ryan with Cynthia Weber.” 1999. International Feminist Journal of Politics 1(3), pp. 460-475. 3 • Cohn, Carol. 1993. “War, Wimps, and Women: Talking Gender and Thinking War,” in Miriam Cooke and Angela Woollacott, eds. Gendering War Talk, pp. 227-246. • Read pages 122-130 in Enloe’s The Curious Feminist. January 30th: Gendering War Talk • Hatem, Mervat. 2003. “Discourses on the ‘War on Terrorism’ in the U.S. and its Views of the Arab, Muslim, and Gendered ‘Other,’” Arab Studies Journal 6(2)/7(1), Fall/Spring, pp. 77-97. • Tetreault, Mary Ann. 2006. “The Sexual Politics of Abu Ghraib: Hegemony, Spectacle, and the Global War on Terror. NWSA Journal 18(3), Fall, pp. 33-50. Optional reading: • Nayak, Meghana. 2006. “Orientalism and ‘Saving’ US State Identity after 9/11.” International Feminist Journal of Politics 8(1), March, pp. 42-61. • Shepherd, Laura. 2006. “Constructions of Gender in the Bush Administration Discourse on the Attacks on Afghanistan Post-9/11.” International Feminist Journal of Politics 8(1), March, pp. 19-41. February